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Hubert Humphrey (1911-1978)/biography
| birth_place =Wallace | death_date = | death_place =Waverly | party =Democratic | spouse =Muriel Buck Humphrey | profession = | religion =Congregationalist (United Church of Christ)/United Methodist |}} Hubert Horatio Humphrey, Jr. (May 27, 1911 – January 13, 1978) was the thirty-eighth Vice President of the United States, serving under President Lyndon Johnson. Humphrey twice served as a United States Senator from Minnesota, and served as Democratic Majority Whip. He was a founder of the Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party and Americans for Democratic Action. He also served as mayor of Minneapolis, Minnesota, 1945–1949. In 1968, Humphrey was the nominee of the Democratic Party in the United States presidential election but narrowly lost to the Republican nominee, Richard M. Nixon. In a renowned speech, Humphrey told the 1948 Democratic National Convention, "The time has arrived in America for the Democratic Party to get out of the shadows of states' rights and walk forthrightly into the bright sunshine of human rights," winning support for a pro-civil-rights plank in the Party's platform. Early years Humphrey was born in Wallace, Codington County, South Dakota. He was the son of Hubert Humphrey, Sr. and Ragnild Kristine Sannes, who was Norwegian. Humphrey spent most of his youth in the small town of Doland on the Dakota prairie. His father was the town pharmacist and a community leader; he served as Doland's mayor and as a town council member. In the late 1920s a severe economic downturn hit Doland; both of the town's banks closed and Humphrey's father struggled to keep his drugstore open. After his son graduated from Doland's high school, Hubert, Sr. left Doland and opened a new drugstore in the larger town of Huron, where he hoped to improve his fortunes. As a result of the family's financial struggles, Hubert had to leave the University of Minnesota after just one year to help his father in the new drugstore. He quickly earned a pharmacist's license from the Drew College of Pharmacy in Denver, and spent the years from 1930 to 1937 helping his father run the family drugstore. He was a brother of Phi Delta Chi, a professional pharmaceutical fraternity and also Alpha Phi Alpha. Over time the "Humphrey Drug Company" in Huron became a profitable enterprise and the family was able to prosper again. However, Hubert did not enjoy working as a pharmacist, and his dream remained to earn a doctorate in political science and become a college professor. In 1937 he returned to the University of Minnesota and earned a bachelor's degree in 1939. He also earned a master's degree from Louisiana State University in 1940, serving as an assistant instructor of political science there. One of his classmates was Russell B. Long, a future senator from Louisiana. He then became an instructor and graduate student at the University of Minnesota from 1940 to 1941 (joining the American Federation of Teachers), and was a supervisor for the Works Progress Administration (WPA). Humphrey would soon become active in Minneapolis politics, and as a result he never finished his Ph.D.. Marriage and family In 1934 Hubert began dating Muriel Buck; she was a bookkeeper and graduate of local Huron College. They were married in 1936 and remained married until Humphrey's death nearly 42 years later. They had four children: Hubert Humphrey III, Nancy, Robert, and Douglas. Through most of his years as a U.S. Senator and Vice-President his home was located in a modest middle-class housing development in Chevy Chase, a suburb of Washington. In the 1960s Hubert and Muriel used their savings to build a lakefront home in Waverly, some forty miles west of Minneapolis. City and state politics (1942–1948) During World War II, Humphrey tried twice to join the armed forces, but was rejected both times due to a hernia. Instead, he served in an administrative capacity in a variety of wartime government agencies; he also worked as a college instructor. In 1942 he was the state director of new production training and reemployment and chief of the Minnesota war service program. In 1943 he was the assistant director of the War Manpower Commission. From 1943-1944 Humphrey was a professor in political science at Macalester College in St. Paul and from 1944-1945 he was a news commentator for a Minneapolis radio station. In 1943, Humphrey made his first run for elective office, for mayor of Minneapolis. Although he lost, his poorly-funded campaign still captured over 47% of the vote. In 1944, Humphrey was the one of the key players in the merger of the Democratic and Farmer-Labor parties of Minnesota to form the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party (DFL). When in 1945 Minnesota Communists attempted to seize control of the new party, Humphrey became an engaged anti-Communist and led the successful fight to oust the Communists from the DFL. After the war, he again ran for mayor of Minneapolis and won the election with 61% of the vote. He served as mayor from 1945–1949. He was re-elected in 1947 by the largest margin in the city's history to that time. Humphrey gained national fame during these years by becoming one of the founders of the liberal anti-communist Americans for Democratic Action (ADA) and for reforming the Minneapolis police force. Previously, the city had been declared the antisemitism capital of the country and the small African-American population of the city encountered numerous instances of racial discrimination. Humphrey worked hard to end these examples of racism, and his tenure as mayor would be famous for his efforts to fight bigotry in all its forms. The 1948 Democratic National Convention The national Democratic Party of 1948 was split between liberals who thought the federal government should assertively guarantee civil rights for non-whites and southern conservatives who thought the states should be able to choose what civil rights their citizens would enjoy (the "states' rights" position). At the 1948 Democratic National Convention, the party platform reflected this division and contained only platitudes in favor of civil rights. Though the incumbent President Harry S Truman had already issued a detailed 10-point Civil Rights Program calling for aggressive federal action on the issue of civil rights, he gave his backing to the party establishment's platform that was a replication of the 1944 Democratic National Convention plank on civil rights. A diverse coalition opposed this tepid platform, including anti-communist liberals like Humphrey, Paul Douglas and John Shelley, all of whom would later become known as leading progressives in the Democratic Party. These liberals proposed adding a "minority plank" to the party platform that would commit the Democratic Party to a more aggressive opposition to racial segregation. The minority plank called for federal legislation against lynching, an end to legalized school segregation in the South, and ending job discrimination based on skin color. Also strongly backing the liberal civil rights plank were Democratic urban bosses like Ed Flynn of the Bronx, who promised the votes of northeastern delegates to Humphrey's platform, Jacob Arvey of Chicago, and David Lawrence of Pittsburgh. Although viewed as being conservatives, these urban bosses believed that Northern Democrats could gain many black votes by supporting civil rights, and that losses among anti-civil rights Southern Democrats would be relatively small. Though many scholars have suggested that labor unions were leading figures in this coalition, no significant labor leaders attended the convention, with the exception of the heads of the Congress of Industrial Organizations Political Action Committee (CIOPAC), Jack Kroll and A.F. Whitney. Despite aggressive pressure by Truman's aides to avoid forcing the issue on the Convention floor, Humphrey chose to speak on behalf of the minority plank. In a renowned speech, Humphrey passionately told the Convention, "To those who say, my friends, to those who say, that we are rushing this issue of civil rights, I say to them we are 172 years too late! To those who say, this civil rights program is an infringement on states' rights, I say this: the time has arrived in America for the Democratic Party to get out of the shadow of states' rights and walk forthrightly into the bright sunshine of human rights!" Humphrey and his allies succeeded; the pro-civil-rights plank was narrowly adopted. As a result of the Convention's vote, the Mississippi and one half of the Alabama delegation walked out of the hall. Many Southern Democrats were so enraged at this affront to their "way of life" that they formed the Dixiecrat party and nominated their own presidential candidate, Governor Strom Thurmond of South Carolina. The goal of the Dixiecrats was to take several Southern states away from Truman and thus cause his defeat. The Southern Democrats reasoned that after such a defeat the national Democratic Party would never again aggressively pursue a pro-civil rights agenda. However, this move actually backfired. Although the strong civil rights plank adopted at the Convention cost Truman the support of the Dixiecrats, it gained him important votes from blacks, especially in large northern cities. As a result Truman won a stunning upset victory over his Republican opponent, Thomas E. Dewey. Truman's victory demonstrated that the Democratic Party no longer needed the "Solid South" to win presidential elections, and thus weakened Southern Democrats instead of strengthening their position. Pulitzer Prize-winning historian David McCullough has written that Humphrey probably did more to get Truman elected in 1948 than anyone other than Truman himself. The Happy Warrior (1948–1964) Minnesota elected Humphrey to the United States Senate in 1948 on the DFL ticket, and he took office on January 3, 1949. Humphrey's father died that year, and Humphrey stopped using the "Jr." suffix on his name. He was re-elected in 1954 and 1960. His colleagues selected him as majority whip in 1961, a position he held until he left the Senate on December 29, 1964 to assume the vice presidency. During this period, he served in the 81st, 82nd, 83rd, 84th, 85th, 86th, 87th, and a portion of the 88th Congress. Initially, Humphrey's support of civil rights led to him being ostracized by Southern Democrats, who dominated most of the Senate leadership positions and who wanted to punish Humphrey for proposing the successful civil rights platform at the 1948 Convention. However, Humphrey refused to be intimidated and stood his ground; his passion and eloquence eventually earned him the respect of even most of the Southerners. Humphrey became known for his advocacy of liberal causes (such as civil rights, arms control, a nuclear test ban, food stamps, and humanitarian foreign aid), and for his long and witty speeches. During the period of McCarthyism (1950–1954), Humphrey was accused of being "soft on Communism," despite having been one of the founders of the anti-communist liberal organization Americans for Democratic Action, having been a staunch supporter of the Truman Administration's efforts to combat the growth of the Soviet Union, and having fought Communist political activities in Minnesota and elsewhere. In 1954 Humphrey proposed to make mere membership in the Communist Party a felony — a proposal that failed. He was chairman of the Select Committee on Disarmament (84th and 85th Congresses). As Democratic whip in the Senate in 1964, Humphrey was instrumental in the passage of the Civil Rights Act of that year. Humphrey's consistently cheerful and upbeat demeanor, and his forceful advocacy of liberal causes, led him to be nicknamed "The Happy Warrior" by many of his Senate colleagues and political journalists. Presidential and Vice-Presidential ambitions (1952–1964) As one of the most respected members of the U.S. Senate, Humphrey ran for the Democratic presidential nomination twice before his election to the Vice Presidency in 1964. The first time was as Minnesota's "favorite son" in 1952, where he received only 26 votes on the first ballot; the second time was in 1960. In between these two presidential bids, Senator Humphrey was part of the free-for-all for the vice-presidential nomination at the 1956 Democratic National Convention, where he received 134 votes on the first ballot and 74 on the second. In 1960, Humphrey ran again for the Democratic presidential nomination against fellow Senator John F. Kennedy in the primaries. Their first meeting was in the Wisconsin primary, where Kennedy's well-organized and well-funded campaign defeated Humphrey's energetic but poorly-funded effort. Kennedy's attractive brothers, sisters, and wife combed the state looking for votes, at one point Humphrey memorably complained that he "felt like an independent merchant running against a chain store." Kennedy won the Wisconsin primary, but by a smaller margin than anticipated; some commentators argued that Kennedy's victory margin had come almost entirely from areas that were heavily Roman Catholic, and that Protestants actually supported Humphrey. As a result, Humphrey refused to quit the race and decided to run against Kennedy again in the West Virginia primary. Humphrey calculated that his midwestern populist roots and Protestant religion (he was a Congregationalist) would appeal to the state's disenfranchised voters more than the Ivy League and Catholic millionaire's son, Kennedy. But Kennedy led comfortably until the issue turned to religion. When asked why he was quickly losing ground in polls, one adviser explained to Kennedy, "no one knew you were a Catholic then." Kennedy chose to engage the religion issue head-on. In radio broadcasts, he carefully repositioned the issue from one of Catholic versus Protestant to tolerance versus intolerance. Kennedy appealed to West Virginia's long-held revulsion for prejudice and placed Humphrey, who had championed tolerance his entire career, on the defensive; Kennedy attacked him with a vengeance. Franklin D. Roosevelt, the son of the former President, stumped for Kennedy in West Virginia and raised the issue of Humphrey's failure to serve in the armed forces in World War II (Humphrey had tried to serve but had been rejected for medical reasons). Humphrey, who was short on funds, could not match the well-financed Kennedy operation; Humphrey traveled around the state in a cold, rented bus while Kennedy and his staff flew around West Virginia in a large, modern, family-owned airplane. There were also accusations (both by Humphrey and numerous historians) that the Kennedys "bought" the West Virginia primary by paying bribes to county sheriffs and other local officials to give Kennedy the vote, however these accusations have never been conclusively proven. Kennedy defeated Humphrey soundly, winning 60.8% of the vote in that state. That evening, Humphrey announced that he was no longer a candidate for the presidency. By winning the West Virginia primary, Kennedy was able to overcome the belief that Protestant voters would not elect a Catholic candidate to the Presidency and thus sewed up the Democratic nomination for President. Humphrey did win the South Dakota and District of Columbia primaries, which JFK did not enter. At the 1960 Democratic Convention he received 41 votes even though he was no longer an active presidential candidate. At the 1964 Democratic National Convention, Lyndon Johnson kept the three likely vice presidential candidates, Connecticut Senator Thomas Dodd, fellow Minnesota Senator Eugene McCarthy, and Humphrey, as well as the rest of the nation in suspense before announcing Humphrey as his running-mate with much fan-fare, praising Humphrey's qualifications for a considerable amount of time before announcing his name. The following day Humphrey's acceptance speech overshadowed Johnson's own acceptance address: Hubert warmed up with a long tribute to the President, then hit his stride as he began a rhythmic jabbing and chopping at Barry Goldwater. "Most Democrats and Republicans in the Senate voted for an $11.5 billion tax cut for American citizens and American business," he cried, "but not Senator Goldwater. Most Democrats and Republicans in the Senate—in fact four-fifths of the members of his own party —voted for the Civil Rights Act, but not Senator Goldwater." Time after time, he capped his indictments with the drumbeat cry: "But not Senator Goldwater!" The delegates caught the cadence and took up the chant. A quizzical smile spread across Humphrey's face, then turned to a laugh of triumph. Hubert was in fine form. He knew it. The delegates knew it. And no one could deny that Hubert Humphrey would be a formidable political antagonist in the weeks ahead. In 1972, Humphrey once again ran for the Democratic nomination for president. He was defeated by Senator George McGovern in several primaries, and was trailing in delegates at the 1972 Democratic National Convention in Miami Beach. His hopes rested on challenges to the credentials of some of the McGovern delegates. For example, the Humphrey forces argued that the winner-take-all rule for the California primary violated procedural reforms intended to produce a better reflection of the popular vote, the reason that the Illinois delegation was bounced. The effort failed, as several votes on delegate credentials went McGovern's way, guaranteeing his victory. Humphrey also briefly considered mounting a campaign for the Democratic nomination from the Convention once again in 1976, when the primaries seemed likely to result in a deadlock, but ultimately decided against it. At the conclusion of the Democratic primary process that year, even with Jimmy Carter having requisite number of delegates needed to secure his nomination, many still wanted Humphrey to announce his availability for a "draft" movement. However, he did not do so, and Carter easily secured the nomination on the first round of balloting. What wasn't known to the general public was that Humphrey already knew he had terminal cancer. Deputy President pro tempore of the Senate (1976–1978) In 1974, along with Rep. Augustus Hawkins of California, Humphrey authored Humphrey-Hawkins Full Employment Act, the first attempt at full employment legislation. The original bill proposed to guarantee full employment to all citizens over 16 and set up a permanent system of public jobs to meet that goal. A watered-down version called the ''Full Employment and Balanced Growth Act passed the House and Senate in 1978. It set the goal of 4 percent unemployment and 3 percent inflation and instructed the Federal Reserve Board to try to produce those goals when making policy decisions. , Minneapolis]] Humphrey ran for Majority Leader after the 1976 election but lost to Robert Byrd of West Virginia. The Senate honored Humphrey by creating the post of Deputy President pro tempore of the Senate for him. On August 16, 1977, Humphrey revealed his terminal cancer to the public. On October 25, 1977, he addressed the Senate, and on November 3, 1977, Humphrey became the first person other than a member or the president to address the House of Representatives in session. President Carter honored him by giving him command of Air Force One for his final trip to Washington on October 23. One of Humphrey's speeches contained the lines "It was once said that the moral test of Government is how that Government treats those who are in the dawn of life, the children; those who are in the twilight of life, the elderly; and those who are in the shadows of life, the sick, the needy and the handicapped," which is sometimes described as the "liberals' mantra." Humphrey spent his last weeks calling old political acquaintances on a special long-distance telephone his family had given him. He also placed a call to his former foe in the 1968 presidential election, Richard Nixon, only to learn the depressed state of the Nixons. Disturbed by this, he called back to Nixon to invite the former president to his upcoming funeral, which Nixon accepted. After his death at home in Waverly, he lay in state in the rotunda of both the U.S. Capitol and of the Minnesota State Capitol. His body was interred in Lakewood Cemetery, Minneapolis. Humphrey's wife, Muriel Humphrey, was appointed by the state governor to finish her husband's term in office. Honors Municipal Building Commission: City Hall and Courthouse timeline]] In 1965, Humphrey was made an Honorary Life Member of Alpha Phi Alpha, the first intercollegiate Greek-letter fraternity established for African American males. He was awarded posthumously the Congressional Gold Medal on June 13, 1979 and the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1980. Buildings and institutions named for Humphrey * The Hubert H. Humphrey Terminal at Minneapolis-Saint Paul International Airport * The Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome domed stadium in Minneapolis * The Hubert H. Humphrey Job Corps Center in St. Paul, Minn. * The Hubert H. Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs at the University of Minnesota and its building, the Hubert H. Humphrey Center * The Hubert H. Humphrey Building of the Department of Health and Human Services in Washington,D.C. * The Hubert H. Humphrey Bridge carrying FL S.R. 520 over the Indian River Lagoon between Cocoa and Merritt Island in Brevard County * The Hubert H. Humphrey Middle School in Bolingbrook. * The Hubert H. Humphrey Comprehensive Health Center of the Los Angeles County Department of Health Services in Los Angeles, CA. * The Hubert H. Humphrey Fellowship Program, which fosters an exchange of knowledge and mutual understanding throughout the world. * The Hubert H. Humphrey Auditorium at Doland High Schoolhttp://www.doland.k12.sd.us/schoolinfo/QuickFacts/QuickFacts.htm in Doland, South Dakota. Personal life Humphrey and his family officially held membership in Minneapolis' First Congregational Church, now affiliated with the United Church of Christ. However, he also attended United Methodist congregations in Minneapolis and suburban Washington, D.C. He was Married to Muriel Humphrey for over 41 years at the time of his death at the age of 66. They had three children. His widow remarried to Republican Max Brown in 1979. She then took the name of Muriel Humphrey Brown. Mrs. Brown passed away in 1998 at the age of 86 with her husband and children at her side. Electoral history 1976 Minnesota United States Senatorial Election 1970 Minnesota United States Senatorial Election 1968 United States Presidential Election 1960 United States Presidential Election 1960 Minnesota United States Senatorial Election 1954 Minnesota United States Senatorial Election 1948 Minnesota United States Senatorial Election See also *Politics of Minnesota *US Congressional Delegations from Minnesota *Humphrey's son and grandson are also Minnesotan politicians. *In the sit-com Growing Pains, the youngest son is named Benjamin Hubert Horatio Humphrey Seaver, though his full name is used only when he's being yelled at. The parents are confirmed Democrats. *In the movie Fear and Loathing In Las Vegas, while Raoul Duke is beating on the white Cadillac, he yells "you people voted for Hubert Humphrey, and you killed Jesus." Hunter S. Thompson who wrote the book the movie was based on, was very critical of Humphrey in one of his other works, Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72. Notes References * Berman, Edgar http://www.medicalalumni.org/bulletin/winter_2006/lead2.html. Hubert: The Triumph And Tragedy Of The Humphrey I Knew. New York, N.Y. : G.P. Putnam's & Sons, 1979. A physician's personal account of his friendship with Humphrey from 1957 until his death in 1978. * Cohen, Dan. Undefeated: The Life of Hubert H. Humphrey. Minneapolis: Lerner Publications, 1978. * Garrettson, Charles L. III. Hubert H. Humphrey: The Politics of Joy. New Brunswick, N.J.: Transaction Publishers, 1993. * Humphrey, Hubert H. The Education of a Public Man: My Life and Politics. Garden City, N. Y. : Doubleday, 1976. * Mann, Robert. The Walls of Jericho: Lyndon Johnson, Hubert Humphrey, Richard Russell and the Struggle for Civil Rights. New York, N.Y. : Harcourt Brace, 1996. * Solberg, Carl. Hubert Humphrey: A Biography. New York : Norton, 1984. * Taylor, Jeff. Where Did the Party Go?: William Jennings Bryan, Hubert Humphrey, and the Jeffersonian Legacy. Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 2006. * Thurber, Timothy N. The Politics of Equality: Hubert H. Humphrey and the African American Freedom Struggle. Columbia University Press, 1999. Pp. 352. External links * * University of Texas biography *Complete text and audio of Humphrey's 1948 speech at the Democratic National Convention - from AmericanRhetoric.com *Complete text and audio of Humphrey's 1964 speech at the Democratic National Convention - from AmericanRhetoric.com *Account of 1948 Presidential campaign - includes text of Humphrey's speech at the Democratic National Convention *Transcript, Hubert H. Humphrey Oral History Interview, August 17, 1971, by Joe B. Frantz, Internet Copy, LBJ Library. Accessed April 3, 2005. * Information on Humphrey's thought and influence, including quotations from his speeches and writings. *Hubert H. Humphrety at the Macedonian Baptist Church, San Franciso, 23 May 1972 Photographs by Bruce Jackson of Humphrey on his last campaign. Humphrey, Hubert